PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL CHARACTERIZATION OF AUTOMOTIVE SHREDDER RESIDUES

Car manufacturers recycle many of the materials from wrecked vehicles, but the disposal of the lighter components is increasingly difficult. The high cost of landfill is making the option of incineration more a ttractive, as it reduces the mass and the volume of the waste. Energy recovery is also possible. This paper examines those properties of aut omotive shredder residues (ASR) which are relevant to the formation of pollutants during incineration. The higher specific energy of ASR was found to be 19,000kJ kg(-1) and the ash content 38%, which indicate t hat it is a suitable fuel for municipal incinerators or cement kilns. However, it is very heterogeneous, as the low density fraction is main ly composed of plastics, with smaller amounts of metallic pieces, rubb er, glass and wood. The macroscopic composition of a representative sa mple of ASR was determined. The metal and the chlorine contents were a nalysed by special techniques and were found to be 22% and 3.5%, respe ctively of the fraction. Laboratory-scale incineration trials of ASR a re now planned. (C) 1997 ISWA.